Palin's Foreign Policy Experience

ST.PAUL - A review of Palin's 20 months in office shows that aside from overseeing the National Guard's state-level emergency missions, as all governors do, the first-term governor played no role in any territorial defense or other national defense operations involving military forces.

In an interview with the Globe, the head of the Alaska National Guard said her role commanding the National Guard was no different from that of any other governor.

That means George W. Bush, too!!!!

Palin has also visited one fewer country than originally stated by her Alaska office.

Do these right-wing Christian nutties ever STOP LYING?!!!!!!!

I'm fucking sick of it, and if you have been reading my blog, I was pre-disposed to grant her the bennie of the doubt.

NOT NOW!!!!!

Earlier in the week, the governor's Alaska spokeswoman was quoted as saying Palin had traveled to Iraq, Kuwait, Germany, and Ireland, in addition to Canada. McCain campaign spokeswoman Maria Comella acknowledged yesterday that Ireland was only a refueling stop on a trip in July 2007 to visit Alaskan National Guard troops in Kuwait and Iraq.

Comella said yesterday that the 2007 trip was her only foreign travel apart from visits to Canada. Comella said Palin first received a passport in 2006. The New York Times reported last week that Palin had needed to apply for a passport so she could visit the troops, but it was not clear whether it was her first.

According to business leaders and academics familiar with foreign-policy issues and Palin's administration, she has demonstrated little interest in expanding the state's trade ties with Canada or Russia compared with some of her predecessors.

Please keep all this in mind when you read what Repuglican supporters have to say.

"So far as I know, Sarah has not been involved in international affairs whatsoever," said Victor Fischer, professor emeritus at the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska Anchorage.

"Alaska is a large state, there's a lot going on within the state," added Fischer, who is a former Democratic state senator and delegate to the Alaskan state constitutional convention in 1955. "We've had governors who have been very involved with world issues, but she's concentrated pretty much on the domestic side."

Lie after lie after lie after lie!!!!

Palin's knowledge of international affairs and security issues is likely to be tested when she debates her Democratic counterpart, Joe Biden, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Comella said yesterday she had been huddling with the campaign's top foreign policy and national security aides this week to study the issues.

This week, McCain and his campaign officials have emphasized that being head of the Alaska National Guard gives her special experience in national security matters.

"She's been commander-in-chief of the Alaska National Guard," McCain said on Fox News Sunday, in a refrain repeated often by GOP leaders this week. "I am proud of her knowledge."

McCain's wife, Cindy, meanwhile, has cited Alaska's proximity to Russia as offering her preparation for the vice presidency. "Remember that Alaska is the closest part of our continent to Russia," she said this week in an appearance on ABC News on Sunday.

It is INCREDIBLE, isn't it?

The CONDESCENDING Repugliccans think YOU are FUCKING STOO-PID, America!

I fear they are right!

Due to its strategic location, Alaska has a large number of military installations established during the Cold War to keep watch on Russia, including Elmendorf Air Force Base, home of the Air Force's 3d Wing, and Forts Wainwright and Richardson, where active-duty Army units are stationed for operations in the Pacific. The Aleutian Islands chain that runs toward the Russian coast is also home to sensitive radar installations.

But those units are under the control of the president, not the state governor, according to top military officials and specialists. And while the Alaska National Guard operates a launch site for a US antimissile system at Fort Greely, about 100 miles south of Fairbanks, the Alaskan governor is not in the site's chain of command and has no authority over its operations, according to Major General Craig E. Campbell, the adjutant general of the Alaska National Guard who commands the roughly 3,800 state militia members.

Nor are the recent deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan by the Alaska National Guard under Palin's purview, despite assertions this week by McCain campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds to that effect. "She is head of the National Guard that has been deployed overseas," Bounds said. "That's foreign policy experience."

Sigh. See what I mean? SHAMELESS!!!

Palin's authority over the Alaskan National Guard applies to domestic missions - such as fighting wildfires and rescuing stranded residents - but she has a limited role in determining how the forces are trained. The McCain campaign has also cited other foreign policy experience, including in the area of trade and energy issues.

O'K, what about those, seeing as she has been less active in pursuing such as her predecessors?

But Palin has demonstrated limited initiative on cross-border issues compared to previous governors, according to Alaskans who deal with trade.

Have you had enough with the LYING yet?

Among her predecessors, Walter Hickel, a Republican first elected in the 1960s who returned to office in the 1990s, proposed a "Multi-Modal Transport Corridor" across the Bering Strait, which he imagined would link the Trans-Siberia Railway to American train lines. Democrat Tony Knowles, whom Palin defeated in 2006, pursued expanded trade opportunities with Taiwan during the 1990s.

Russell Howell, director of the American Russia Center in Anchorage, said that while many Alaskan oil-exploration companies have strong interest in pursuing Russian partnerships, Palin has not played a noticeable role.

Howell's organization has helped facilitate contact between Russia and Alaskan business and government leaders during past gubernatorial administrations. "I have not heard that Governor Palin has done anything like that and we have had no contact with her about visiting Russian officials," said Howell.

How you doin' chewin' on those lies, Americans?

Asked to respond to contentions that Palin does not have sufficient foreign policy experience, her spokeswoman Comella said: "Governor Palin has the judgment required for these dangerous times and the background as an executive making tough decisions needed to manage large organizations. She oversees responsibility for the National Guard and State Defense Force responsible for responding to state emergencies and has displayed leadership in the energy security discussion."

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Warning: Some commentaries may include profanity. I offer my apologies in advance for those who may be offended by the harsh language in response to outrageous lies.